Fates Warning Re-Wired: A Chat with Ray Alder Page 2
by Martin Popoff

"I didn't know what I wanted to write about. Jim had always asked me to write lyrics, and I just never felt it was my place within Fates Warning. I love Jim's lyrics, I think they're great. So when I was asked to do something for this album I guess I have a little more confidence in myself, so to speak, after I did the Engine project. 'One' was going to be the first song on the record and I knew it was going to be the first song we were going to open with on tour, so I wanted it to be an audience/band-related type song, something we could both connect through. And it speaks for itself: when we play live, we take a part of each other home when we are done with the show, or with the tour. It's a memory that lasts forever. Basically it's sort of a thank you."

'Pieces Of Me' is interestingly, written along the same lines. "That one was strange. That was a collaboration between Jim and I. In the studio, we had the song written, but not the lyrics, and it was coming down to the wire and we said what are we going to do for the lyrics? So I penned the lyrics for the verses and Jim came up with the lyrics for the chorus. Again, 'Pieces Of Me': being on tour, doing what you have to do. It also has to do with the title of the album, Disconnected. Sometimes you are with the fans, sometimes you aren't with the fans, and sometimes you are disconnected from writing and the music industry. We all felt that way at one time or another." Which also leads into the theme of 'Something From Nothing', which Alder explains as "that empty feeling inside, looking for something, and you don't even realize what's there. I realize that I'm actually really happy doing what I'm doing. It's an absolute gift in life to be able to write and record music and have people enjoy it. You are making something that will be around forever and ever."

Throughout the album this idea of being disconnected recurs, an idea the band continued through the album graphics, one depicting the idea that we are all disconnected from the march of time, another featuring puppets disconnected from their puppeteer, another of a girl losing grip on a balloon, and another being an old photo that Jim had found, which had to do with disconnecting telegraph wires during the war. A shot they didn't use that almost made the cut was of a dog with leash attached, wandering off down a country road. The cover shot depicts a couple with gas masks on, disconnected from each other.

Fates Warning Re-Wired: A Chat with Ray Alder Page 3